Bill Chappell

Bill Chappell is a writer and producer who currently works on The Two Way, NPR's flagship news portal. In the past, he has edited and coordinated digital features for Morning Edition and Fresh Air, in addition to editing the rundown of All Things Considered. He frequently contributes to other NPR blogs, such as All Tech Considered and The Salt.

Chappell's work at NPR has ranged from being the site's first full-time homepage editor to being the lead writer and editor on the London 2012 Olympics blog, The Torch. His assignments have included being the lead web producer for NPR's trip to Asia's Grand Trunk Road, as well as establishing the Peabody Award-winning StoryCorps on NPR.org.

In 2009, Chappell was a key editorial member of the small team that redesigned NPR's web site. One year later, the site won its first Peabody Award, along with the National Press Foundation's Excellence in Online Journalism award.

At NPR, Chappell has trained both digital and radio staff to use digital tools to tell compelling stories, in addition to "evangelizing" — promoting more collaboration between legacy and digital departments.

Prior to joining NPR in late 2003, Chappell worked on the Assignment Desk at CNN International, handling coverage in areas from the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Europe, and Latin America, and coordinating CNN's pool coverage out of Qatar during the Iraq war.

Chappell's work for CNN also included producing Web stories and editing digital video for SI.com, and editing and producing stories for CNN.com's features division.

Before joining CNN, Chappell wrote about movies, restaurants and music for alternative weeklies, in addition to his first job: editing the police blotter.

A holder of bachelor's degrees in English and History from the University of Georgia, he attended graduate school for English Literature at the University of South Carolina.

As of Monday, U.S. citizens who travel to Cuba will no longer be limited to bringing back goods worth up to $400 — including $100 worth of tobacco and alcohol. President Obama ordered the changes, which also clear the way for Cuban-origin pharmaceuticals to gain U.S. regulatory approval.

Instead of those special quotas, normal limits on Americans' importation of foreign products for personal use will apply.

Promising information that is more standardized and complete than has previously been available, Attorney General Loretta Lynch says the Department of Justice will collect data on the police use of deadly force in the line of duty.

At least 18 deaths are now associated with Hurricane Matthew, the powerful storm that made landfall in South Carolina as it made its way up the Atlantic coast Saturday. After more than a foot of rain fell in several parts of North Carolina, Gov. Pat McCrory says eight people died as a result of the storm. Authorities say five people are missing.

"As the sun rises in North Carolina and the blue sky returns, our state is facing major destruction and sadly, loss of life," Gov. Pat McCrory said Sunday. "This storm is not over for North Carolina."

A week after a deadly stampede brought anti-government protests and violence to a fever pitch, Ethiopia declared a six-month state of emergency Sunday. Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn says the declaration is necessary for the government to protect both property and citizens' lives.

A collision between a transit train and a maintenance train injured nearly 30 people east of New York City Saturday night, as a Long Island Rail Road train derailed near New Hyde Park. Hundreds of passengers were aboard the LIRR train when the collision occurred around 9:10 p.m. ET.

"The silver lining is, we're fortunate that more people weren't seriously hurt," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said during an early-morning visit to the scene Sunday. He added, "The damage to the train cars is extensive."

An attack on a funeral hall killed 90 people and wounded more than 560 in Sanaa Saturday, Yemen's rebel government says. The Saudi-led coalition has promised to conduct an immediate investigation into the airstrikes.

"We're mobilizing to support health facilities deal with the influx of dead and wounded," the Red Cross delegation in Yemen says, adding that it's sending 300 body bags and medical supplies to help cope with the violence's effects.

As fears are confirmed about the extent of the damage Hurricane Matthew inflicted on Haiti — with a government agency saying 470 people died in one district alone — USAID is airlifting more than 480 metric tons of relief supplies to the small nation.

An official in Haiti's Civil Protection Agency tells the AP that in addition to the 470 deaths he's confirmed in one district, "The death toll is sure to go up."

Saying that it's "an absolute priority for the entire Olympic Movement" to protect clean athletes, top officials from the International Olympic Committee and major sports federations are agreeing to relinquish more control over catching cheaters to the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Making landfall Saturday, Hurricane Matthew brought floods and strong winds to South Carolina's Lowcountry region, pouring rain into an area that now faces a dangerous storm surge. As of 11 a.m. ET, the storm's center was around 55 miles south-southwest of Myrtle Beach.

South Carolina, California, and Virginia are among the states that snapped up high-profile sporting events after the NCAA decided to relocate seven championship events from North Carolina over the state's transgender law.

The events include early rounds of March Madness; North Carolina had already lost the NBA's All-Star Game because of its controversial HB2 law that limits civil rights protections for LGBT individuals.

The state of Vermont and the city of Phoenix have joined the list of places that now call the second Monday in October Indigenous Peoples' Day, in a show of momentum for honoring indigenous people on the federal holiday that's named for Christopher Columbus.

Jesse Watters says his story was meant to be tongue-in-cheek — but his critics say he invoked a string of Asian stereotypes in a segment taped in New York City's Chinatown district. Instead of lampooning racist bigotry, his critics say, the segment embodied it.

Fox anchor Bill O'Reilly included the segment on Monday's edition of his show, saying that he sent Watters to Chinatown "to sample political opinion" because China has been repeatedly criticized by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Joshua Wong, 19, who helped lead the large-scale pro-democracy protests that took over parts of Hong Kong in 2014, was refused entry to Thailand Wednesday. Wong was detained and put on a return flight after being blacklisted at China's request, Thai newspaper The Nation reports.

When Wong landed in Bangkok, he found a large group of immigration officials and police waiting for him; he was sent back to Hong Kong about 12 hours after he landed.

Days after explicit pornography was shown on a large video screen along a busy intersection in Jakarta, a man who's accused of hacking the billboard is facing charges of immoral actions — and a maximum punishment of six years in prison.

The video played for several minutes at the start of the afternoon rush hour last Friday afternoon. City officials cut power to the billboard — and then investigators tracked down an Internet provider address that they say led them to the suspect, a 24-year-old identified publicly only by the initials S.A.R.

In a development that could give Spain sorely needed momentum on its path to forming a new government, Pedro Sanchez resigned as the leader of the main opposition Socialist Party. Sanchez had promised to step down if the party voted to end his ban on enabling a coalition conservative-led government.

The tally in Saturday's vote was 133-109; according to El Mundo, the vote was held by a show of hands, after critics dismissed the use of a ballot box as an attempt to rig the vote.

It may weaken somewhat as it spins in the Caribbean, — but forecasters still say that Hurricane Matthew will likely bring winds topping 100 mph when it makes landfall. Parts of Haiti, Cuba and Jamaica are on alert, as Matthew's maximum sustained winds were measured at 140 mph Saturday afternoon.

Hurricane conditions could hit Jamaica and Haiti by Monday, with tropical storm conditions possible by late Sunday, the National Hurricane Center says. It adds that hurricane conditions could also hit eastern Cuba by Monday night.

Aleppo, Syria's divided city where airstrikes hit two rebel-held hospitals earlier this week, is under renewed attack, as reports emerge that Russian and Syrian forces are using incendiary phosphorous munitions as part of an intensified shelling and bombing campaign.

It's one of the most famous delis in the U.S., if not the world; its food has been called "nearly orgasmic" — but now comes word that New York's famed Carnegie Delicatessen will be closing its doors at the end of 2016.

In the TV comedy version of Portland, Ore., the bookstore is called Women and Women First. In real life, it's In Other Words — and the shop is using frank terms to say the Portlandia show is no longer welcome to film there. The feminist store and community center faults the show's depiction of men dressing as women, its treatment of store staff, and its role in gentrification and race relations.

Saying that Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore violated judicial ethics when he ordered judges not to respect the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark ruling on same-sex marriage, Alabama's Court of the Judiciary suspended Moore for the rest of his term in office.

One week after a House panel highlighted sexual harassment claims at Yosemite National Park and elsewhere in the National Park Service, the superintendent of Yosemite, Don Neubacher is stepping down, the agency says.

According to NPS regional spokesman Andrew Munoz, the agency "acted to move Don Neubacher from his role" leading the park to protect the integrity of its investigation into allegations of a hostile work environment at Yosemite.

Days after he agreed to forfeit outstanding stock awards worth about $41 million over his bank's creation of millions of unauthorized customer accounts, Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf is facing more questions on Capitol Hill.

"We should have done more sooner," Stumpf told members of the House Financial Services Committee, adding that he and Wells Fargo will keep working on the problem.

It's believed to be a first — and it certainly came as a surprise: Ancient Roman coins have been found in the ruins of a castle in Okinawa, Japan, that dates to the 12th and 15th centuries. The copper coins were found in 2013; X-ray analysis shows that they bear an image of Constantine the Great.

The U.S. trails Switzerland and Singapore in economic competitiveness in a new global index that finds America's infrastructure, health system and primary education are all lagging. The World Economic Forum's index also notes three U.S. strengths: Its large market, financial sophistication and labor efficiency.

As officials in Charlotte, N.C., consider when, if, and how to release video of the police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott earlier this week, lawyers for the family have released what they say is eyewitness video taken by Scott's wife.

Betty Shelby, the Tulsa Police Department officer who shot and killed Terence Crutcher, is being charged with first-degree manslaughter in the case, Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler says.

Providing details on a large hacking case, Yahoo says it believes "information associated with at least 500 million user accounts was stolen." The company says its investigation suggests the stolen data doesn't include payment and bank account information, which it says are stored in a different system.

Yahoo suspects that a "state-sponsored actor" performed the hack, stealing users' account information from the company network late in 2014.

Ruling on a lawsuit filed by a state's Democratic attorney general against its Republican governor, the Kentucky Supreme Court says Gov. Matt Bevin doesn't have the authority to unilaterally slice money out of a state university's budget.

The breathtaking sadness of seeing a boy suffering amid Syria's civil war has prompted a breathtaking offer of hospitality and kindness.

The sight of shell-shocked 5-year-old Omran Daqneesh, who was wounded in an airstrike in Aleppo, left many people speechless last month. It also prompted a New York boy named Alex to write to President Obama with a simple request: "Can you please go get him" so Omran can become part of Alex's family?